Entries this day: Dream Internet_sucks_sometimes back_onboard! zzzz

Dream

10:39am JST Saturday 24 December 2005

I told my friend that some aliens were about to land, and she didn't believe me, and I let her not believe me because they actually were coming *right now*, and I didn't have time to convince her. Their ship came down, looking like an inflated bouncy game for kids, and it landed not on the land where I expected, but on a lake, and it just floated there without a problem. The door opened and they walked out and across the water as if it were solid and into a room. I ran over to meet tem, and they looked rather human, wearing space suits. I extended my hand to shake hands with a man looking alien, and he indicated he knew he was familiar with the custom. I wanted to ask, but hadn't yet, if he would show me his true form. he showed me somehow that he wanted to show me his true form, and said we could take a pictue. My friend got a camera and the alien changed into a smaller shape and his head fell off with a hard klunk on the ground. He didn't move for a moment, so I put the head back up near the body, and then it rejoined and he was back to looking normal hman-ish again. I saw the picture, and it just looked like his head was leaning over, and mine did too, for that matter, adn just looked like a silly head tilted posed picture. I looked for my video camera, but didn't find it before we had changed topics. The alien was looking through his stuff to find something and I put the picture (Polaroid) on a metal frame with a magnet, which fell off the frame and went behind something else where it stuck, and I was inspired to ask a question, so I asked in simple English, "May I ask you a question?" and he was like, "probably", and I asked, "that you have seen, is physics the same everywhere?" He goes, "yes; physics is the same everywhere." I looked over at my human friend. "that's a relief!" with a half joking smiile, but actually half real because if we were on such a wrong track as thinking it was the same everywhere, but wasn't... eek.

I was considering asking him if he could help go over some equations we had been writing to describe some physics experiements, and he was like, "by the way, I can help simplify those equations you are working on," and as I was wondering if I would be able to explain the new math, he wrote a slightly different version of the equation, and was saying, "this new form will allow you to drop a whole _____ of your equation," indicating a fudge factor we had introduced. I could see the beauty of it, but wasn't really able to understand the math before I woke up.

Internet sucks sometimes

2:55pm JST Saturday 24 December 2005

I've recognized a base reason I've had such trouble getting pictures from this computer to my website: If I use the auto-thumbnail creation thing, the filenames are 0.jpg, 1.jpg, 2.jpg etc etc etc when I want them to have descriptive names.

Also, when I use the auto-thumbnailer, I end up changing the .html files to .shtml files, and adding code to let them work with my top-of-page navigation.

But when I give them descriptive names, I don't have a way to automagically create a clickable thumbnail grid type thing.

- - - -

Hitomi sent me some cash via paypal so I can buy her an underwater camera case. But my paypal account isn't set up to accept credit card payments, and I don't want to because that would cost extra money, I think even for bank payments, which just sucks big butts. Hitomi was having trouble getting a bank account set up on her paypal account, so we were trying to get it figured out, but I couldn't log in to see what she was seeing cause it would log her out and vice versa, and it's a pain in the ass to type and talk on a cellphone, and all this whiney blah blah bullshit, but.. in the end I'm just bummed that I'm being so tightass with money. fuck fuck fuck.

Why can't I just accept the gift and be done with it?

back onboard!

10:26pm JST Saturday 24 December 2005

Just like they said, being back on board is like being back home. Every staircase known like an old climbing buddy, and lots of the same crew welcoming us back for another round. Sabrina, Wu, Sasha, and others others others whose names I don't remember or never knew...

Been helping load lots of stuff (*), and about to go upstairs to scope the top deck view... but it's COLD so I won't be up there long.

1:55am JST Sunday 25 December 2005

There's no smoking allowed in Hemmingway! The horrible hall of smoke has been condensed to one smoke ventilation machine! I'm so thrilled with this!!

(*) Tony and I were to meet at 4pm in Yokohama, but he was unable to get there at that time due to such long distance traveled, etc. He called me a bit before 5pm, once I had already arrived at the terminal, and got directions.

We helped get shiznit organized for GET, and I helped a human chain tossing boxes for the convenience store up the steps from the 4th floor to Broadway. Enjoyed that pretty well, occasionally using only one hand, rarely making jokes in Japanese.

Got to chat with Stacy while we chowed; he's been on like 9 voyages; lots of history in his brain that I'd like to explore. Back to work after food, and this time I worked a bit down on the pier, but the wind felt quit nippy, so I went in to get my big coat and gloves. After a bit, I felt bad for not having met Matt at 9pm, so I went up to find him.

Found him on 6th floor, in a meeting with Joel, Yuuka, Sachie, and Tony.

zzzz

1:49am JST Sunday 25 December 2005

What a blessing to have my own room for a night, giving me the space and time to slowly arrange my junkola the way I imagine I'll want it during the voyage. And I enjoy not having as much stuff. All my goodies will basically fit within the closet and drawer that I can use for the voyage. I'm in room 3027, across the hall from 3029, where Shawn, Shunji and I were on 49th.

I've read the intro to Speaker for the Dead (I think that's the right URL) this evening, and I have imaginings that I'll be able to finish it during the voyage.

- - - -

I've spent a lot of time considering which bed I'd prefer to use. I'm choosing the top bunk, it seems.

I always seem to like top bunks, but I was torn between having a top bunk and a bunk in which I could sit up. (bottom bunk where the top one is folded away; we will have only 3 people in this 4 bunk room)

2:19am

good night. (though I'm going to read some)